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Capillary flow-driven blood plasma separation and on-chip analyte detection in microfluidic devices

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Abstract

We report a comprehensive review on the capillary flow-driven blood plasma separation and on-chip analyte detection in microfluidic devices. Blood plasma separation is the primary sample preparation step prior to most biochemical assays. Conventionally, centrifugation is used for the sample preparation process. There are numerous works reporting blood plasma separation in microfluidic devices which aim at miniaturizing the sample preparation procedure. Capillary-based blood plasma separation shows promise in actualizing point-of-care diagnostic devices for applications in resource-limited settings including military camps and rural areas. In this review, the devices have been categorized based on active and passive plasma separation techniques used for the separation of plasma from capillary-driven blood sample. A comparison between different techniques used for blood plasma separation is outlined. On-chip detection of analytes present in the separated plasma obtained using some of these reported devices is also presented and discussed.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to acknowledge SERB, DST, India (EMR/2014/001151), and IIT Madras (MEE1516843RFTPASHS) for the financial support.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Mechanical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai, 600036, India

    M. Sneha Maria & A. K. Sen

  2. Department of Biotechnology, Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai, 600036, India

    M. Sneha Maria & T. S. Chandra

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  1. M. Sneha Maria
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  2. T. S. Chandra
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Correspondence to A. K. Sen.

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Maria, M.S., Chandra, T.S. & Sen, A.K. Capillary flow-driven blood plasma separation and on-chip analyte detection in microfluidic devices. Microfluid Nanofluid 21, 72 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10404-017-1907-6

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